Skip to main content

Venice Film Festival · 2026

Venice Film Festival 2026

Critics' Week

In addition to the features below, this section also showcases a number of shorts.

Programme

9 films

Jump to a film

Before The War (Prima della guerra)

Guido has earned the respect of his peers through violence in the racist and macho environment he grew up in. But when she meets Sonia, a Kosovar immigrant, something shifts. Guido finds himself torn between the world that raised him and the one she is opening up for him.

(Country: France, Italy; Year: 2026; Director: Tommaso Usberti; Writer: Tommaso Usberti; Stars: Piero Usberti, Luàna Bajrami, Claudia Poli)

The End Of Times (El Fin De Los Tiempos)

Salomé reviews decades of family videos to understand her mother's sadness. In this search, she uncovers a past marked by exploitation and historical violence in Colombia and Latin America. By using artificial intelligence to imagine a less terrible world, she discovers that it is easier for us to conceive the end of the world than the end of capitalism.

(Country: Colombia; Year: 2026; Director: Bibiana Rojas Gómez, Juan David Cardenas; Writer: Juan David Cardenas; Stars: María Inés Toro, Gerardo Cárdenas, Gustavo Hernán Idárraga)

Giaffa The Great (Il Gran Giaffa)

Giacomo Falta is a man ignored by everyone, unable to find his place in the world. When he meets the charismatic Giason the Great, the man who embodies everything he has always wanted to be, he makes a dangerous decision.

(Country: ITaly; Year: 2026; Director: Marco Santi; Writer: Marco Santi, Lorenzo Bagnatori, Eva de Prosperis; Stars: Edoardo Pesce, Carlotta Gamba, Barbara Chichiarelli)

Opening film

The H@llow Man

2059, Tunisia. A biochip regulates memory and suppress emotion. Hypnotherapy is forbidden, but Taha secretly consults a hypnotherapist. He is a pathos-smith: through poetry, he forges for others the emotions they can no longer feel. While under hypnosis, Taha crosses a forest and reaches a house. Inside, a man and two women are preparing a suicide attack.

(Country: Tunisia; Year: 2026; Director: Kamel Laaridhi; Stars: Mohamed Hassine Grayaâ, Nesrine Bani, Riadh Hamdi, Kamel Dridi, Sadok Aidani)

London

London, a disabled young adult, has built his life around fierce independence. He works as a dominant at a fetish house alongside his crippled friends Luke and Lilá. When a medical consultation offers London the chance to understand his body and disability through an exam, he faces an unexpected dilemma.

(Country: Brazil; Year: 2026; Director: Victor Di Marco, Márcio Picoli; Writer: Victor Di Marco, Márcio Picoli; Stars: Victor Di Marco, Jéssica Teixeira, Pedro Bertoldi, Carla Cassapo, Priscilla Colombi, Emilio Farias, Manu Thedy)

Meteorite

Tefa and Nia live in a small town near the Magdalena River, where they raise Nia's young nephew. Nia persuades Tefa to join her in smuggling cellphones into the regional prison. Their journey leads them through an extravagant amusement park built on the grounds of a drug lord's former estate. As they wander among water slides, verdant paths, and concrete dinosaurs, disquieting memories whisper in the summer heat.

(Country: Colombia; Year: 2026; Director: Sebastián Múnera; Writer: Sebastián Múnera, Martha Marquez; Stars: Ángela Cano, Luna Gaviria, Esteban Madrigal, Jesus Gutierrez, Jaime Andrés Castaño)

Our Share Of Sand

After years apart, 12 year-old Maya returns to India with her mother to reunite with her father - a sandmining businessman. Immersed in a world where labour, legacy and extraction collide, she forms a fragile bond with Kiran, a young worker. After a tragic event, a police investigation turns Maya into a key witness.

(Country: India, UK, Greece; Year: 2026; Director: Shalini Adnani; Writer: Shalini Adnani; Stars: Maya Mehta, Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub, Ellora Torchia, Krish Raj More, Ravi Patel, Jyoti Dogra)

Rider

A young delivery driver has a fateful meeting on New Year's Eve.

(Country: Italy; Year: 2026; Director: Roan Johnson, Davide Pavanello; Stars: Lorenzo Aloi, Kaze, Mattia Mor, Kyshan Wilson, Johnny Marsiglia, Levante, Ensi, Rosa Chemical, Axos, Alice Rosso, Federica Bonani, Margherita Vicario, Claudio Santamaria)

Closing film

Zoom In, Zoom Out (Fa xian zhi lü)

Shi, a young game designer, embarks on a difficult journey across the city to look for his missing roommate Gao. Following a clue hidden in an online game, he unexpectedly meets YY, Gao's girlfriend. Bound by their shared search for answers, Shi and YY navigate both the real world and virtual game spaces, pursuing the truth.

(Country: China; Year: 2026; Director: Dong Jie; Writer: Dong Jie; Stars: Sunny Sun, Eva Zhao, Tong Linkai, Zhu Xin)